author's note
Thanks for the brilliant people who heeded my words last time. You're all brilliant and lovely, so here's a chapter for your enjoyment!
note For a vocal demonstration of what Naminé was singing, please look up 'Emotions Cover by Ariana Grande'. Her cover of 'Vienna' is incredible too. She is simply stunning.
enjoi.
tumbling
"So, do you have the Virtual Piano application?" I asked him while he fiddled with his phone. Luckily, I'd bought a bottle of water with me to practice. I watched the gaps between the trees, loving this weather. I'd taken of my trench coat and stuffed it into my locker and was now harbouring a pair of Dior cat-eyed sunglasses.
"Yeah, I do. Just wait a sec," he pressed a few more buttons while I got up and practiced a few more vocal exercises. I tried to suppress my giggles when I saw Roxas smiling into his phone, knowing he was finding my dolphin exercises amusing.
I was ecstatic. I now had the means to sneak around and see if Ventus was blackcat, plus, Roxas hung out with Neku sometimes, so I'd be able to check and see if Neku could have been the mystery blogger. He might not have seemed like a social person, but looks can be deceiving.
"What's your lowest note?"
"E flat three," I said, letting out a few reverberating notes. It was kind of hard to go this low for me. I was a soprano.
"Damn, how large is your scale?" he asked me, raising an eyebrow.
"It's around four octaves, I think."
"But that would mean…" he looked at me, his eyes growing wider, "do you have a whistle register?"
"Last time I checked."
"That is incredible, Naminé. It's so rare now and c'mon, you have to show me," he said, his eyes filled with excitement.
I have to try and make it loud enough for Kairi to hear.
"Let me warm up a little more. I'm practicing with Emotions by Mariah Carey, or is that a little too pop for you?"
"Beggars can't be choosers," he shrugged before ushering me to hurry up. We waited a little while for the right section of the song.
"It feels like a dream,
When you touch me tenderly.
I don't know if you're for real,
But I like the way you feel… insi-i-i-de."
My voice absolutely flew over the E7 note, hitting the whistle note with the perfect accuracy I'd been practicing. I was a little nervous, so I couldn't hold the note as long as I wanted to. I tried again the next time the whistle note came around:
"And you know the way,
To make me lose control.
When you're looking into my eyes,
You make me feel so hi-i-i-i-i-i-oh-oh-oh!"
Roxas clapped excitedly and I performed a little bow, smiling, even though my throat felt a little sore. I massaged it as I sat down next to him again and bumped his shoulder with mine.
"Your turn."
"No," he pouted, turning away.
"C'mon, you baby. I hit the whistle register for you," I pleaded, using a mock-offended voice.
"How about no?" he said, keeping the note neutral, but I could tell he wasn't go to jump through the hoop for me. "Please Naminé, I really don't want to."
I sighed, generally disappointed. "Alright, fine. I'll just sing by myself. Look through my playlist and pick a song for me."
He had one in seconds. "Billy Joel is classic. Here's a pretty one."
Luckily, I didn't have to warm up for this, and started singing immediately. What I wasn't aware of were the people accumulating at the mouth of The Prayer Garden.
"Slow down, you crazy child,
You're so ambitious for a juvenile.
But then if you're so smart, tell me,
Why are you still so afraid?
"Where's the fire, what's the hurry about?
You'd better cool it off before you burn it out,
You've got so much to do and,
Only so many hours in a day.
"But you know that when the truth is told,
That you can get what you want or you get old.
You're gonna kick off before you even
Get halfway through
When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?"
When I opened my eyes and stopped singing most of the music class were staring at me, and I panicked before hiding behind Roxas who had recorded me. Sneaky bitch.
"That was incredible, Naminé," Ms Gainsborough clapped, as did most of the class, along with more surprised whispers of 'Woah, is that Naminé?' and 'I thought she was new'. "It looks like we have our lead soprano."
"Oh no!" I shook my head, "I couldn't."
"Why didn't you tell us you were so talented?" a student who I couldn't remember the name of ask. "In singing anyway. We knew that you were a fine violin player."
"Was it you who just hit the whistle note?" Ms Gainsborough asked, green eyes stared at me imploringly. I flushed, a little bit of the 'old Naminé' coming back as I looked down and flushed before nodding. I looked up and saw Kairi and Xion behind everyone else, looking at me scathingly. I huffed and looked up straightening my back to prove that I wasn't intimidated. I was kinda, but, you know. Hard to argue with Ms Gainsborough.
"Yeah, it was. I didn't choose to do vocals because I believed there were already too many singers," I narrowed my eyes at Kairi, "in the class."
"Well, if you have a voice like that, there's always room."
"Ah," Kairi pushed past people to stand before Ms Gainsborough, "Miss. You said that I could be the main vocalist."
"Oh course, Kairi," she said, entertaining her, "for the first six parts. We'll give Naminé the lead in the final seven parts."
"What? But I'm no beginning act!"
"Now Kairi, it's obvious here that Naminé has better control of her falsetto voice. That's needed to sing the main song in the second acts."
"Okay, fine," the red-head pouted, crossing her arms over her chest.
I let out a small huff of happiness, sending a smug smile in Kairi's direction. She scowled at me, which had to be the most vicious looking expression she'd ever sent me before. I was happy. Served the bitch right.
"Alright, class," said Ms Gainsborough, "homework is going into pairs and making a unique alteration to 'The Promise', which is the main theme for XIII, as the play has been called. Class dismissed."
xox
"So, my house or yours?"
He thought about it, scratching the back of his head, "I'm not sure. My apartment's super small and Ven's staying over at the moment."
"An apartment sounds exciting," I told him. Oh snap, I hope that didn't sound sarcastic. "It's just that I've never been to one before. If you come over to mine, you're going to have to deal with Hayner, Pence and Olette. They're coming over to do their homework."
"Do you live in the library?" he asked me, grinning.
"No, but they really like my house."
"We should head there then."
"They probably won't be doing their work though, hallway through they always get distracted and we end up watching YouTube videos or playing Black Ops."
"Sounds like fun," he replied softly. There was something about his tone…
"Hey Roxas?"
"Hn?"
"Do you have any friends at school? Save Vanitas and Ventus, or Riku and Sora? You don't even seem close to them sometimes."
"Nah," he replied, but he didn't sound like he minded. "During middle school I was bullied. You didn't notice because you were running in Kairi's circles."
"Oh Gods, my tale of woe," I said embarrassingly, chewing my bottom lip. We were trekking up Market Street right now. Roxas' house was in Sunset Terrace, and mine was on Sunset Hill. I never realised how close we lived.
"You might not have noticed, but our school was very conservatist. Someone had gone around and spread the rumour that I was gay, and that set off a chain of events ending up with Seifer tormenting me daily."
"Is that why he was sent away?" I asked him.
"Yeah, I broke three of his ribs," Roxas admitted, and I smiled despite myself. "The Principle was a good man, he knew that even though Seifer was the victim, he'd take the entire incident into account. The reason why he was harassing me, and then he sent him to Balamb, since it's a disciplinary military school. I hear Fuu and Rai are going to transfer there next year."
"You should hang out with us sometime," I told him as we approached my driveway.
"Sweet Shiva, is this your house?" he asked me, even though I was clearly walking into the driveway.
"Mhmm. Welcome to my humble domain," I told him, pirouetting before opening the door. "I'm home," I sing-songed, dancing through the foyer and landing in the kitchen where Pence, Olette, Hayner, Cloud and Leon were fighting over a packet of popsicle sticks. Roxas looked at me with alarm. "Standard afternoon procedure."
"I see…" he answered, stretching out the word with disbelief.
"Hyne! Naminé brought a boy home," Leon said, grasping Cloud's shoulder.
"Hey," my brother said, "you're Axel's ex-boyfriend right?"
"Guilty as charged," Roxas replied.
"You're not hitting on Nami are you? Because it's my sworn brotherly duty to bash you if you are."
"Oh God," I shook my head.
"No," Roxas smiled while shaking his head, "not right now anyway." I flushed.
"Good, because I won't trade Naminé's hand for any less than three cows and two sheep," my brother joked, but I felt like slamming my head into the wall.
What are we in? The Middle Ages?
Pence and Olette cracked up while Hayner looked at us with confusion.
Roxas took my hand and kissed the knuckles, "Don't worry, I'll be sure to provide the proper recompense."
I blushed crimson and ripped my hand from his. He didn't seem disappointed though, he was grinning. Sneaky… He'd just told my brother that he wasn't going to hit on me.
"Cloud, remember what I told you about drugs and how you shouldn't do them?!"
"We've got a little music project to do," Roxas explained, placing both of his hands into his pockets.
"I'll go grab my laptop."
"I'll come with you."
"Use protection," Leon commented offhandedly.
"Shut up, Squall!" I yelled in mortification, watching his mock-offended look as I ran up the stairs. Roxas followed me up, chuckling.
We entered my room and he sat on my bed while I looked around for my laptop, hidden under piles of school work and sketches.
"So is it just you and Cloud here?"
"Cloud, Leon and I. Our parents are in Hollow Bastion at the moment, but we get along fine."
"You don't get lonely here?"
"No, I have blackcat to… Oh wait," my reply had been instantaneous. I'd gone and depressed myself. "Well, I did have blackcat. But I guess I don't anymore."
He picked up a sheet among the mess on my bed, "This was the song you were singing at the café."
"He wrote it for me," I replied sadly.
"This is only a minute's worth of lyrics. Where's the rest of the song?"
"That was all there was. But I'm writing some lyrics," I told him, finally locating my laptop in the mess. "I think if I finish the song for him, he might come out of hiding. What do you think of that?"
He shrugged, looking nonchalant, "It might work."
I caught a note in his voice that just didn't seem right, "Roxas, do you dislike blackcat?"
"I'm telling you now, Nami. I'm not his biggest fan."
"Why not?"
He shrugged again, getting up from my bed, "He just seems a little unreal to me. What if he's not everything you dream him to be? What if he's just a normal guy who's afraid he isn't going to be what you want him to be, when you finally come face to face? Or a troll? What if he's a fifty-five year old pedophile?"
I didn't realise my voice was shaking until the lump in my throat was literally stopping me from speaking. "I don't- I- He could be any of those things, Roxas. But I… I just need to know."
xox
Roxas ended up making me sing the main chorus of 'The Promise' and adding a dub step tune to the background of it. We were sure Ms Gainsborough was going to like it, so we finished up at the same time Olette completed her homework as well. Pence and Hayner soon followed and by the end of the day, we were playing multiplayer Assassin's Creed III on my PS3 system; Roxas and Hayner versus Pence and I.
After we won our second game, we decided to go into one final game that would be the tie breaker.
"So I think it would have been cooler if Aveline was one of Desmond's ancestors," I commented.
"Yeah, but then they'd have to deal with making her one of the main protagonists, and she'd need to get her own game," Roxas replied.
"Girls make horrible assassins," Hayner laughed, right before I performed an aerial assassination on his poor ass.
"You were saying, Hayner?" I gloated.
"Whoo!" Olette cheered.
"Whose side are you on?" Hayner whined while he was waiting to respawn.
We were in the final ten seconds of the game, and I was stalking Roxas, making sure he wasn't going to run away. He must have screen cheated or something because he noticed I was following him and his character started running away.
"You cheat!" I cried, trying to chase him.
He let go of one side of his controller and used his hand to poke at my ribcage. That was a cheap shot because I was incredibly ticklish and let out a horrified laugh. Using one hand, he managed to land on Pence's character and assassinate him, while tickling me so fiercely that I dropped my controller.
After the game, Olette told Roxas he should sit with us at lunch time, and the three of them went home, leaving me with a very handsome music partner.
"I'll do a little more research on blackcat tonight," he assured me.
"There has to be a way to repay you for this Roxas," I told him, trying to resist the urge to brush his bangs from his eyes.
"How about dinner at my place? Friday night," he purred, making my knees weak with that beautiful sensual tone of his, paired with the amazing lop-sided grin. I felt my lips spread into a slow smile and nodded my head, practically radiating happiness as he reached forward to tuck a blond bang behind my ear. He leaned forward and for a second, I thought he was going to kiss me. My senses were flooded by his heat and scent, when he pressed his lips to the top of my cheekbone. Sweetly.
What a gentleman.
I waved as he walked down the drive, throwing his skateboard down, hopping onto it and disappearing before a completely ridiculous thought popped into my head.
I feel like I'm cheating on blackcat with Roxas.
I pressed three fingers to my lips, and worried the bottom one between my teeth.
Life is just too confusing right now.
tbc.
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